What is a Hostile Vehicle Attack Assessment?
Hostile Vehicle Attack Assessment (HVAA) helps in identifying potential vulnerabilities to vehicle attacks and informs the development of mitigation strategies. It involves analysing how, where, and at what speed a vehicle can be used to breach, damage, or terrorize a sensitive area deliberately or due to a lapse in access control.
Unlike conventional perimeter reviews, an HVAA focuses explicitly on kinetic threat scenarios where a vehicle is intentionally used as a tool of assault, sabotage, or forced entry.
Why HVAA is Critically Important?
- Unpredictable Yet Catastrophic
Hostile vehicle attacks are often low-cost, high-impact methods used by lone actors or terror outfits. A single-vehicle breach at a public gathering, VIP event, or defence facility can result in mass casualties or infrastructure compromise. - Physical Security Blind Spots
Many facilities have wide, direct approach roads and limited physical barriers creating vulnerabilities to high-speed vehicle incursions. - Regulatory and Design Compliance
HVAA helps facilities align with international standards and national physical security best practices.
Core Objectives of HVAA
- Identify all potential vehicle approach paths to the protected facility
- Determine the feasibility of high-speed or forced vehicle ingress
- Evaluate existing barrier effectiveness against defined vehicle types
- Simulate impact scenarios (worst-case attack vectors)
- Recommend design modifications and barrier placements
- Enable safe crowd and vehicle segregation zones
Technical Dimensions of Hostile Vehicle Attack Assessment
1. Threat Modelling
- Profiles threat actors (e.g., truck ramming, car bombers)
- Categories vehicle types
- Predicts motivations and potential targets (entry gate, pedestrian node, main block)
2. Approach Route Analysis
- Evaluates road geometry, gradients, turning radii, and surface type
- Identifies long straight paths that allow acceleration
- Maps run-up zones where speed can be gained before impact
3. Speed vs. Impact Simulation
- Uses physics equations to calculate realistic impact energy
- Matches it against resistance levels of walls, gates, fences, bollards
4. Barrier Rating Assessment
- Are your bollards crash-rated?
- Are barriers anchored deep enough?
5. Crowd Vulnerability Mapping
- Identifies zones of maximum human density
- Evaluates exposure risk during entry/exit rush hours or events
- Recommends physical segregation or re-routing
Deliverables of a Hostile Vehicle Attack Assessment
A full Hostile Vehicle Attack Assessment (HVAA) provides:
- Vehicular threat zoning maps
- Vehicle approach velocity simulations
- Crash force impact energy diagrams
- Recommendations for physical and geometrical deterrents
- Optimal placement of fixed/static and dynamic/active security systems
- Integration roadmap for access control, surveillance, and HVM systems
Mitigation Measures Proposed
Post-assessment, sites receive recommendations such as:
- Crash-rated fixed barriers
- Retractable road blockers
- Raised planters/earth berms to block direct approach
- Staggered lane entry
- Vehicle exclusion zones in public congregation areas
- Controlled access protocols during events or high-alert periods
Conclusion
In today’s risk environment, protecting a campus or facility requires more than aesthetics and CCTV, it demands engineering foresight. Hostile Vehicle Attack Assessment gives decision-makers the technical insights needed to build robust, impact-resistant environments that are as secure as they are functional.
MitKat provides comprehensive Hostile Vehicle Attack Assessment (HVAA) wherein we evaluate site-specific vulnerabilities to vehicle-borne attacks, providing customised hostile vehicle mitigation strategies through rigorous analysis of approach routes, achievable speeds and potential impact forces against existing barrier systems. Deliverables such as effective mitigation measures include strategically positioned security infrastructure and precise design modifications to significantly enhance the campus’s overall security posture and resilience against vehicular threats.
To secure your campus or facility through science-driven security engineering, connect with our experts today.